Monday, April 3, 2017

#AtoZChallenge 2017 - C for Cup

I asked the little one C for? I was now geared up for the likes of cranberry and crocodile and catapult. She kept it simple. Went for C for Cup.

My morning cup of hot coffee just went into my system and is doing its wonderful job of rejuvenating my being. Caffeine is bad, I hear you. We Tamilians always have our coffee with milk and so its 80% milk. Healthy Coffee :)

That reminds me of the tea shops at Ooty and Kodaikanal - hill stations and popular tourist spots in TamilNadu. In a misty weather, with a few drops of rain here and there, the mere sight of these tea peddlers and their carts can lift ones soul. The steam coming from the boiling water in the cart floats away and blends with the whiteness in the air and when the cup touches the lip for the first sip(I am getting poetic now) of that tea, its pure bliss. The smell of the tea, a little bit of ginger and some green cardamom is heavenly. Someone would be selling hot corn on the cob nearby and that aroma seeps into your being too.

As a kid I used to love pouring the tea into a saucer, holding it with both hands and slurping it with that bubbling noise. (A little repulsive to my polished being now of course but fun then ). Who uses saucers these days? I wonder!

Then there are all the cups associated with the sporting world. FIFA World Cup, Cricket World Cup and the like. When India first one the cricket world cup, I was two years old and when it won again the second time, my son was two years old. A simple sweet coincidence in life to smile about.

That takes me to a TV serial I watched as a kid. A girl from a poor family is a good athlete and wins a trophy in her school and takes it home happily. The next morning she finds her drunkard father using it as a cup for his morning fill of alcohol and is totally shattered. Alcohol addiction is a serious problem especially in the lower rung of the social ladder. Almost every house help who has worked for my mother or mother-in-law has told us stories of torment due to their drunkard spouses. All the money these men earn is totally spent on alcohol forcing these women to toil in different homes to meet their daily needs. Worse is when their money is also snatched by these addicts for satiating their thirsts. It saddens me when movies spread wrong messages about alcohol being a kind of medicine that helps you forget all disappointments and failures in life. Hope society keeps changing for the better.

This made for yet another fun read, Jayashree. I have fallen in love with Coffee recently though I am die hard Chai fan. Aah! The fun of drinking tea from the saucer and competing with sisters on who makes the loudest slurping sounds... those were the days!!